


Never Seen

by WolfAndHound_Archivist



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst, Drama, Marauders' Era
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-05
Updated: 2016-02-05
Packaged: 2018-05-18 08:57:58
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,022
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5918716
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WolfAndHound_Archivist/pseuds/WolfAndHound_Archivist
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Teenage Remus attempts to keep Sirius from getting into trouble. So what else is new?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Never Seen

**Author's Note:**

> Note from Lassenia, the archivist: this story was originally archived at [Wolf and Hound](http://fanlore.org/wiki/Wolf_and_Hound), which was created to make stories posted to the Sirius_Black_and_Remus_Lupin Yahoo! mailing list easier to find. However, even though I still love the fandom, I am no longer active in it and do not have the time to maintain it. To preserve the archive, I began manually importing its works to the AO3 as an Open Doors-approved project in December 2015. I posted an announcement with Open Doors, but we may not have reached everyone. If you are (or know) this creator, please contact me using the e-mail address on the [Wolf and Hound collection profile](http://archiveofourown.org/collections/wolfandhound/profile).

Ethan Rayne was infamous. Kicked out of Hogwarts in his sixth year, for - no one knew quite what for. They snapped his wand and told him never to return, and that would have hurt most people. Like Hagrid, who sat quiet and docile and hardly ever spoke to anyone but his animals. But not Ethan. Nothing could break him, they said, and there were whispers that he still practiced magic, somewhere in London; the wild, unlawful kind that didn't need wands as long as you Had it In You. And Ethan did.

Sirius was fascinated with him.

Which wasn't at all surprising, Remus told himself, because Sirius loved mischief in all forms, and was too innocent himself to recognize evil when he saw it. Remus wasn't; he could see the glimmerings of true, unbalanced hate start to tendril in Ethan, but when Sirius wanted something...Well.

_he's supposed to be the goddam puppy, Re_

So they went to London, summer after their own sixth year. Without James, because he was busy and that hurt Sirius badly, so badly that Remus gave up arguing before he even began. And without Peter, because it was always easier to do things without Peter.

And this was easy. So easy you'd think it had been planned in advance, and he almost thought that was true - because Sirius found him their first night there. Wearing leather and a face full of metal, and with his own puppy by his side. Ripper, Ethan introduced him laughingly, because that was exactly what you **wouldn't** call this boy. Who was trying **so** hard to be bad, to fit in, to make Ethan glance in his direction without amusement, and failing miserably. Much like Remus, who didn't say anything at all, but watched and calculated.

They made a wonderful pair, for a few weeks. Ethan and Sirius, that is, with Ripper and Remus tagging along behind. Hoping to God they wouldn't get themselves killed. Noticing the little, painful things, in order to smooth them away later: the start of James' name on Sirius' tongue every time he began to outline a new scheme, the way Ethan shied away from even the lightest of gentle touches and instead threw himself onto other people's fists.

He only had a few distinct memories from those two weeks that weren't Sirius' face twisting with every frightening new emotion. He could remember Ripper, whose look of quiet understanding mirrored his own and made him ache, because

_what are **we** doing in this world anyway?_

And he remembered one night, when he'd been walking by himself to assuage the pain, trying to keep the lines of fear and jealousy out of his thin face. A pale orb had loomed out of the shadows, a woman with dark hair and eyes madder than anything he'd ever seen. She stroked his cheek, lightly, and he couldn't move.

"I like you. You're wild." She growled convincingly. "And so open to hurt-" 

She turned abruptly: "Spike, can I have him?"

An answering rumble came from a few feet behind her, where Remus could just see the glint of impossibly blond, spiked hair. "No, pet. We've got to get going. Nasty Slayer in New York, remember?"

Her feet had danced her back, closer to the man who couldn't even **see** Remus, and that feeling was starting to get familiar. "Can I have another taste of her?"

"Anything for you, baby." And the invisible boy had trembled at the sound of that voice. Love without reservation, which frightened him almost more than the couple themselves.

The woman looked back at Remus for an instant, smiled, and wished him luck. And giggled, laughed like a lunatic as Spike dragged her from the alley. Leaving Remus stunned with rage and fright, without any clear idea why. He ran back to Ethan's as soon as the shock wore off, because something

_something **bad**_

was going to happen, and he was willing to bet every last Galleon that it had to do with Sirius. Because really, it always did. And apparently Ethan had discovered that too.

Cries greeted him at the door, and he didn't know why but that was Sirius' voice and so he darted through the living room to find the source. Which turned out to be Ethan and Sirius, sprawled on the bed together in a messy, heated tangle of limbs. Laughing together as they licked and kissed and stroked their way over each others' bodies, and he was left

_stunned again._

Until Ethan, as always, turned it into something hard and violent, and Sirius told him to stop. Whimpered, in a terrified voice, as the boy - only one year older than he -

_a year and a thousand_

ground him into the bed, whispered that he wanted to make him bleed, make him scream, the hate he felt for something so **good** evident in his voice. Rage effectively scorched through the jealous fog that surrounded Remus. Made him **throw** Ethan across the room, pull Sirius into his arms and drag him back outside, into the street.

"No one **ever** hurts you again," he said, trembling, because he'd never been so sure of anything in his life. Sirius was the only thing he could see, standing out with a strange glow that meant, maybe that Remus was all **he** could see, too. And he'd never seen Sirius kiss anyone the way Sirius was kissing him now, soft and **safe** and so sweet...

When they went back to Ethan's, just to pick up their things before retreating into each other again, they could hear his pained screams coming from the bedroom, and Ripper's tones with a cruel, nasty streak in them. Newly risen from the ashes and not happy about it. But he and Sirius forgot the sound as soon as they left, because that part of them was over.

Remus remembered the mad eyes of the woman in the alley, later, and came as close to smirking as he ever had.

_beat you, didn't I_

It wasn't until he read the headlines five years after graduation that he realized why she'd been laughing at him.


End file.
